must be exalted in proportion). This same
sympathy that we are all so prone to feel on their
behalf is often very mischievous to them,
instead of being any solace. The commonest,
—let us say boldly, the vulgarest,—shows
itself first in taking excessive care that the
blind child does not hurt itself. Pray observe,
we say excessive care. In its home, we see the
mother, and everybody else, removing every
thing out of its way, opening all doors, catching
hold of its petticoats, or never leaving hold of
them, never letting it alone, to do what it can
and likes. It is tender-spirited, timid, and
excessively cross or passionate. Put the
same child into a good school for the blind,
and what is it like in a month's time? Why,
it runs up and down stairs, scuds along the
passages with merely the finger-tips touching
the wall, lays a hand precisely on the knob
of every door, washes and dresses with perfect
neatness, swings, runs races—even playing
blind man's buff by the ear—says lessons,
dines quite cleverly by the aid of the blind
man's fork,—so made as to hold just a proper
mouthful—laughing instead of crying, at any
tumbles, blunders, or little difficulties not yet
surmounted. The mother, coming to visit her
child, is all amazement. Can this merry,
active, dexterous, agile child be the same that
was so lately fretting in her arms, the
constant anxiety of the entire household?

Next, when there must be addresses spoken,
or hymns sung, on anniversary or other
charity occasions by the children, the address
and the hymn will always be found stuffed
full of the very things the children know
nothing about, and would not naturally speak
of. They tell the audience precisely what
the audience knows, and they themselves do
not know;—how much they lose by not seeing
sun or star, how beauteous are the hues of the
flowers and the rainbow that they shall never
behold—that to them nature is a blank, and
so on; whereas, if they speak or sing at all, it
should be what they can feel, about what they
have gained, and not about what they lose.
It was bad enough that Dr. Blacklock, in
Scotland, and a blind lady, in England, wrote
descriptive poems. They had a mind to do it,
and they did it; and of course the descriptions
were merely wonderful as a matter of
memory, and not good as descriptions; but it
is far worse to put such things into children's
mouths as genuine utterance, and, above all,
as religious sentiment. We were once behind
the scenes in such a case. There was to be a
public meeting for the benefit of a Blind
Asylum. An address, in verse, was asked for
in various directions, and several were sent in,
and thought very beautiful. But a bystander
observed that they were all crammed with
stars, beams, gleams, hues, and so forth, and
suggested that trial should be made to
produce one without a single direct visual
image in it,—nothing but what some inmate
or another of that very school had felt or
thought. This seemed a new idea to the
managers; but they acted upon it, and with
clear success. We do not relish such addresses
and public hymn-singing (we mean by a body
of sufferers exhibiting themselves to raise
money, by means of their privations and
devotions together); but, if such utterance must be
for a time permitted, at least let it be true.

Next, we object to the false sensibility
which would keep the blind (or indeed any
other imperfect) persons from "a knowledge
of what they lose," as the expression
commonly is, Surely they lose quite enough,
after the utmost has been done for them;
and what right have we to keep from
them anything that they are able to learn?
We do not mean, of course, that we are
to bemoan their lot,—to sit down in the
dust with them, like Job's comforters, and
enumerate all the blessings they may wish
for in vain. All that may be left to the
consciousness of the blind. What we mean
is, that we do not see the kindness of being
silent to a lame person about the view
from a mountain top, or to a deaf person
about the echoes at Killarney, or to a blind
person about a sunrise at sea, or a sunset
among the mountains. If the blind person
ever saw sunsets, he will be eager to have
the impression revived by descriptions. We
know one who gets read to him all the
critiques upon the picture galleries from the
newspapers; as we know a person become
deaf, who once was musical, who reads with
vast pleasure all accounts of new oratorios,
and London concerts. If the blind have
never seen, they ought to know as much as
they can of what interests other people.
Really, one might as well caution young
people against dancing in the presence of the
old. For that matter, we might as well
put our finger in our eye, when a sailor or
traveller tells us of the beauties of Batavia,
or the glories of the Himalayas. How many
of us will see those beauties and glories?
The less chance there is of our going to see them,
the more important it is that we should learn
from those who can describe them to us. A
bedridden old lady likes to hear, when her
daughter comes in from her walk, about the
dew on the hedges, and the purple light upon
the hill: and we ought to take for granted
that the stricken blind will enjoy the rousing
of old visual memories, as we all enjoy reviving
the stories of our youth. The fact is,
it is now too late to prevent this happy
process of participation. The blind can now
read—a good many of them—and all will,
by and by; and when our literature is
opened to them, none shall say them nay,
as to any matter that is contained in books.
Their nice sense of touch, which used to be
little more than an empty marvel to us, we
have now learned to make use of in unbarring
the doors which shut them out from literature.
We now print books for them, in a
type which they feel, instead of see; an
embossed type which they learn to run over